


Three Days Human

by Anonymous



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Depression, Gen, Mild Language, pre-destiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-18
Updated: 2018-05-18
Packaged: 2019-05-08 11:41:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14693496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Castiel is not dealing well at all. Then Dean falls sick.





	Three Days Human

**Author's Note:**

> So I just found out anon posting to ao3 is a thing! Here's an old fic from the tail end of season 8 + the original livejournal header.
> 
>  **Title:** Three Days Human  
>  **Author:** [redacted]  
>  **Rating:** PG-13 (language)  
>  **Genre and/or Pairing:** Castiel, Dean, Sam gen, (pre-slash)  
>  **Spoilers:** Up to and including 8x23  
>  **Warnings:** Depression, Mild language  
>  **Word Count:** 1922  
>  **Summary:** Castiel is not dealing well at all. Then Dean falls sick.  
>  **Disclaimer:** Not mine, never will be

It's to be expected, really. Not that Dean hasn't been worried about Cas - he has, a niggle in the back of his head _Gotta help Cas adjust - it's almost 2014. Shit._ reminding Dean of the newly de-graced angel's presence - but it's Sam who takes up all of the elder hunter's time, leaving Castiel to flounder about in his unwanted humanity. And taking care of Sam is a full time occupation, one that started when Dean was four - or maybe even before then, when Dean comforted Mary while she wept over John, her hand falling to the still flat belly that harboured a precious life.

So as Dean labours over Sam, fetching him blankets, making sure the cut on his hand stays free of infection, or coaxing spoonfuls of soup down his little brother's throat, Cas is forgotten, a shadow that hovers about the bunker, trying desperately not to sleep, and growing ever thinner from the food he isn't eating. Cas regards Dean's care of Sam with an almost jealous intensity, tempered with the guilt he feels when he remembers how the night sky had been alight with the falling bodies of his brethren, with bitterness toward The Voice, and lastly anguish, for he now has lost any hope of ever setting things right. Yet Castiel does not dare venture outside after Dean brings him and an unconscious, shaking Sam to the bunker. He is mortal now, in all senses of the word, and terror is not a strong enough word to describe how he feels when his feet bring him to rest at the entrance of the underground residence. 

Castiel leaves other attempts at stepping outside alone after that, preferring to wallow in his self-pity, upset to have lost one of the last reminders of his former existence, as Dean had come upon him the evening of that first day, idly flipping his sword back and forth, and had taken it from him, a startled expression on his face. Thus Cas is lonely, and angry, bitter and bordering on apathetic, when as the evening of the third day comes to a close, he is jolted to his feet by a tremendous crash coming from Sam's room. 

At first, Cas does nothing, clutching at his chest with one trembling hand. He's not scared by the noise, but it's sudden, unexpected after nothing but the maddening, unceasing, _unrelenting_ silence that not even Dean's worried humming could penetrate. When no other sounds follow, Cas relaxes back against the wall, letting himself slump to the ground, a fresh wave of self-loathing washing over him. He wants to scream, frustrated by the fact his voice, that once had the power to deafen humans when he whispered, now is broken and raspy, roughened by hours and hours of disuse after his treacherous brother had slit his throat. 

The lack of the off-pitch humming is what finally prompts Castiel to drag himself off the floor and down the corridor to Sam's room. After everything, Dean is his friend, and Cas can't ignore the unease that lingers in his stomach. With unsteady feet, Cas lurches down the hall, legs numb from sitting so long, head spinning from lack of food. His belly gurgles when his nose catches the sent of hot soup from the open doorway, but Cas has to rub at his eyes before he understand what the wet stain seeping out into the corridor means. 

Cas' eyes follow the spilled liquid to the upturned bowl it's leaking from, to the wooden tray that is split jaggedly across the middle, to the prone form of Dean Winchester, and Castiel feels a hot flush of shame when he realizes that his first thought was of his hunger rather than his friend's well being. 

"Dean," he tries, shaking the crumpled form. On the bed, Sam is sweating, caught in a delirium that renders him useless. "Dean," Castiel rasps out once more, shaking the hunter a little harder, and receiving a groan for his efforts. Trying to overcome the gnawing pangs that have him glancing back toward the mess on the floor, Cas rolls Dean over and props him against the foot of the bed, bringing his face a scant two inches from Dean's as he tries to assess what the fluttering of Dean's eyelids bodes. 

"Dean, wake up!" Cas pleads, not liking the skittering feeling in his chest, nor the increase in panicked breaths he seems to be taking. 

"Sam?" Dean mumbles, eyes opening, but staring everywhere except Cas, pupils larger than Cas thinks they ought to be. 

"He's safe, Dean," Cas replies, and a minute amount of tension appears to exit Dean's body. "What happened, Dean, why were you on the floor?" Cas is aware that the question sounds foolish as soon as he asks it; Dean fell of course, but the cause of his fall is what Cas is trying to get at. Even with his eyes unfocused, Dean manages to glare at Cas, and snort, because the answer is obvious, and Cas could scream for his inability to convey his meaning. He wants to say more, but his head hurts, everything tilting on its axis when he moves, making thinking more difficult than it has reason to be. Instead Cas closes his own eyes and takes a deep breath. 

"Dean, if you're not harmed...the floor is filthy." 

Something like a laugh rattles its way out of Dean's ribcage. "Figures, since you're in here. If I'd made it to the bed, Sam would be the one with hot soup all over him." 

Castiel shakes his head, wincing as he does so, confused by Dean's words, although they make some sort of sense. 

"Sit here, I'll fetch a rag," he says, making to rise. Dean catches his arm. 

"You even know where the kitchen is?" 

"Of course," Cas replies, terse and irritated. "I have been here before." He shakes off Dean's grip and moves to leave the room. A quiet squelching sound informs him that Dean is following him. He turns to reprimand the hunter, but the look he gets in response silences him. Still dizzy, Cas makes his way to the kitchen, Dean carrying the empty bowl and broken platter as he pads along behind him. When he turns to stare at Dean, the hunter shrugs. 

"Gotta take care of Sammy." 

Cas sees what Dean meant after he emerges from beneath the sink, an old rag clutched in his fist. The younger man is leaning over the stove, scooping fresh soup into a new bowl. He looks up when Castiel's fingers curl around his wrist. 

"What?" 

"You are in no condition to bring Sam additional sustenance," Cas states, flinching back a little when Dean growls at him. 

"Because you've always done your best by Sam," he spits out, angry at what he perceives as interference in the way he cares for his brother. Cas' fingers fall away, only to pluck the ladle from Dean's hands. Dean whirls around to protest, but is cut off by a hand pressed firmly against his forehead, blue, blue eyes staring into his. 

"You are not well Dean," Cas proclaims, prompting Dean to roll his eyes, because coming from an ex-angel who is swaying on his feet seeing as he refused to eat for the last three days? 

"I'm fine," he insists, knocking Cas' palm away. "Go back to sulking in the corner while I take care of Sam." 

"You collapsed on the floor, Dean," Cas bites out, voice dropping to reflect his growing frustration. 

"Won't happen again," Dean mutters darkly, trying to push by the angel-- _human_ now. _Gotta remember that_ to get back to Sam. He doesn't expect Castiel to wrest the bowl from him, spilling more soup onto the dark floor, nor for the ex-angel to forcibly drag him into his own room, letting him flop against the mattress that eagerly welcomed him. Dean scrambles up again quickly, or tries to - for an angel turned human who's teetering on the brink of exhaustion himself, Cas is still surprisingly strong. That's when it sinks in for Dean. 

"Shit! I'm sick!" he exclaims, only realizing he spoke out loud when Castiel nods, before slipping out the room, his "I'll feed Sam. Rest, Dean," trailing off into the air. 

Cas stops by the kitchen first, washing down two-week old Ritz Crackers with a glass of water. Pain shoots through his stomach, the organ putting up a token resistance as if punishing him for denying it substance, but Cas ignores the cramps in his belly as he takes the still half-full bowl to Sam's room. By the time he's finished forcing what little Sam will accept down the fever riddled Winchester's throat, Cas feels a little better, but no less tired. A sponge lies on the besides table, and Cas uses it to rid Sam's forehead of the beads of sweat that have settled there. 

In his troubled sleep, Sam cries out for Dean, pitiful moans that reduce Castiel to tears before he departs. It's been three days, but Sam isn't healing, and Dean has sickened from expending all of his energy on Sam, and Castiel has almost starved himself into oblivion because he is unable to deal with a condition that 7 billion people have been born with. Cas creeps back to Dean's room, nibbling more crackers, salty from the tears he can't stop streaming down his face. The hunter has lapsed into unconsciousness, his body doing the best it can to fight the illness that has seized him. And Cas, Cas just sits by Dean's bed, and cries and cries. 

~

The days following are harrowing. Cas does his best to eat, to keep his strength up, but the grueling work involved makes him wonder how Dean managed for three days without a break, and his primary (only) concern was Sam. Cas finds some books in the library that speak of fevers and the like. It's a normal, ordinary book, if yellowed from age, and many of the remedies are of the herbal, country variety. Quite a few of the ingredients listed are familiar to Cas, and for the ones that aren't he consults the Men of Letters' item catalogs, which neatly order and cross-list everything stored at the bunker. 

After a week, Sam still isn't healing, hovering in a worrying state between life and death. Dean's fever breaks however, and Cas offers up a small prayer before he remembers that there is no one left - nobody worthwhile - to hear him. He is worn out from tending to the Winchesters, and it is not with a little happiness that he gazes down into Dean's bloodshot green eyes, lucid for the first time in days. 

"Sam is he-?" Dean manages, and Castiel shifts. 

"He is as he was," Cas replies, and Dean nods, pain marring his fever-thinned face. 

"Take me to him," Dean begs; Cas does, when Dean has recovered his strength some more. 

"I'm sorry you were afflicted," Cas tells Dean later, both of them sitting at the kitchen table. "I was...greatly alarmed. But I found purpose, watching over you and Sam both." 

"So you'll eat?" Dean questions, rings upon rings under his eyes that his time abed has served only to worsen. Castiel fixes his eyes upon Dean's. 

"I'll eat." 

"Good, because Sam, he comes first. Always. But Cas, I need you. I-" Dean breaks off, looking away, and Cas finds himself reaching across the table to take Dean's calloused hand in his. 

"I'll be here," he says, and means it.


End file.
